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Those of you following us on Twitter would be aware that I had been on a trip to Seoul and Tokyo, courtesy of Qualcomm, to get a feel of 3G services and devices in two of the most advanced telecom markets in the world. Starting today, I will be posting some of my observations as well as videos from the trip.

I will start with the device that impressed me the most – the Sharp IS01 – an Android smartphone, which I would refer to as a mini-netbook, thanks to its form factor. It runs on Qualcomm’s 1 GHz Snapdragon processor, looks like a slightly magnified Nokia Communicator and has the most comfortable keypad on a device of its size.

Yes, it runs on Android 1.6 at the moment (we are told it will be updated to Android 2.1) but the form factor of the device was more than enough to make me ask the sales rep whether I could break the contract and get an English Android ROM ported to it. (For the record, he did not fall for it…)

The Sharp IS01 might not be as slick as some of the Internet Tablets doing the rounds and is quite a handful (check the video below when I fumble towards the end trying to open it with one hand). However, for a road warrior like me, the wide display and the spacious QWERTY keypad were more than sufficient to seal the deal.